Joined: 05 March 2017Posts: 2214Location: I've been where Aragorn hasn't, but I now live in a cross between Hobbiton and Rivendell.Country:Gender: Male

Not as totally fantasy as all that, though – at least after the destruction of Númenor and the changing of the shape of the world at the end of the Second Age. JRRT very firmly placed the action of TH and LoTR on our planet (some fans seemed to think it was on a different planet – getting High Fantasy and Science Fiction mixed up there, I guess). At least as far as distances and latitude / longitude wen, JRRT once (in a letter?) placed the Shire in England’s West Midlands (so the Grey Havens are in Wales?), Gondor about where Rome was, Mordor concurs with the Balkans (where the straw that broke the back of the WW I-ready camel called Europe was located ). Some of those Third-Age mariners who finally established that the world was now indeed round, early James Cooks, passed by or briefly landed on Straya. But maybe they were Black Númenorens of Umbar, the later Corsairs, so their knowledge did not enter into the Red Book. Wondering what an Aborigine fan of JRRT’s would think of that analogy when comparing it to 1788 …

I've actually been on the site for ten years now (my anniversary was around september I think, but my first account disappeared somehow when I took a hiatus some years back) and it's definitely extremely quiet. I think one of the biggest issues is the lack of an active mod team. Most forums I'm on that have a lot of active staff usually also has a lot of active members.

I think a good move would be if the big boss came back and arranged for members to apply to become mods, out of those who are still active etc. With new backup by some "officials" I actually think we could get this place active again. At least somewhat, in some sections. Perhaps an overhaul of the look, the rules, the different sections too. But of course all of that takes time and energy and as long as the forum is as it is now I fully understand that no one's really up for the extreme amount of work that would come with it.

Joined: 05 March 2017Posts: 2214Location: I've been where Aragorn hasn't, but I now live in a cross between Hobbiton and Rivendell.Country:Gender: Male

I’m sure I’ve posted something of the sort before, and on A-U, too, but I couldn’t tell you the exact thread (not here, the previous page goes back to February 2017, before I joined) – things like that happen when you’ve passed 60 …

In one way, I can only go on second-hand (at best) information, as I do not own a smartphone. My more than 10-year-old SMS-able thingy is holding up fine (meaning the rechargeable batteries). And I only got connected to the Internet at home in October 2013. But my impression is that people are shifting their Internet usage to the mobile gadgets more and more, with the young-uns leading the migration as usual. So we old notebook geezers may be a dying breed (and I believe even tablets are stagnating by now?). Another impression that I have, I believe confirmed by Microsoft’s announcement to cancel (further development of?) their W10 OS version for mobile gadgets, is that a notebook-compatible site – or let’s call these gadgets full-scale PCs, compared to limited-use (for serious office applications) mobiles – won’t work unadapted on some (most? All?) smartphones. E~S mentioned that she even had issues with her tablet. So maybe from the point of view of smartphones, the protocols or whatever of our (and other sites, like CoE) are heading in the direction of the floppy disk (perhaps the 3.5 inch thingies encased in a hard plastic covering with a movable “gate” providing access to the magnetic-tape like surface, hopefully not the 5.25 inchers yet that lived up to the name, and had to be kept in semi-envelops to protect their magnetic-tape like surface). I’m guessing that to adapt such sites to (full) smart-phone compatibility needs some non-trivial reprogramming. And very probably the site owners, from posts I have read by the relevant mods, are not going there. Our sites are like aged pets, allowed to dodder around our retirement pastures for sentimental reasons.

Joined: 04 November 2005Posts: 19405Location: In a pudle on Naboo with dragon kind and ents and Jedi and wolves living in the Last Homely House!
Gender: Male

Bellatrix wrote:

I've actually been on the site for ten years now (my anniversary was around september I think, but my first account disappeared somehow when I took a hiatus some years back) and it's definitely extremely quiet. I think one of the biggest issues is the lack of an active mod team. Most forums I'm on that have a lot of active staff usually also has a lot of active members.

I think a good move would be if the big boss came back and arranged for members to apply to become mods, out of those who are still active etc. With new backup by some "officials" I actually think we could get this place active again. At least somewhat, in some sections. Perhaps an overhaul of the look, the rules, the different sections too. But of course all of that takes time and energy and as long as the forum is as it is now I fully understand that no one's really up for the extreme amount of work that would come with it.

I very much agree with this.

The only real issue is the big boss is to busy... :/

I have inquired as to such things in the past. Even got Arweb tonreply herself one time. Basically all I got was that she doesn’t have the time to do much of anything on the site other than simply make sure it stays up. I really donthink, though, if it were done it would make a huge difference.

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